How to Fix/Recover Corrupted/RAW SD CARD

Hello! i've recently recovered my 128GB SD card that got corrupted and i am here to walk you through how to recover almost everything,
After searching and searching i found no tutorials on how to do it so i'm making a tutorial.
Before we begin i have to say i did this on my Windows 8 Laptop for my O3DS so it might look different
but should mostly look the same.

DISCLAIMER:
THIS METHOD REQUIRES YOU TO FORMAT YOUR SD CARD AND USE A DATA RECOVERY TOOL TO RETRIEVE THE DATA
IF YOU'RE UNSURE OR DON'T WANT TO TAKE A RISK YOU CAN TRY OTHER METHODS
BUT THIS WORKED FOR ME AND IT COULD WORK FOR YOU IT'S YOUR CHOICE

READ THROUGH EVERYTHING HERE IN CASE YOU ARE UNSURE ABOUT SOMETHING
OR DON'T WANNA RISK SOMETHING ANY QUESTIONS I'LL TRY MY BEST TO ANSWER

IMPORTANT TO NOTE:
MAKE SURE YOUR SD IS EVEN CORRUPTED TO BEGIN WITH, TRY USING IT ON DIFFERENT DEVICES
AND USING AN EXTERNAL SD CARD READER AS BUILT-IN CARD READERS CAN BE UNRELIABLE
IF THAT STILL DOESN'T WORK TRY RUNNING CMD AS ADMINISTRATOR AND TYPE "chkdsk (DriveLetter):"
AND SHOULD CHECK FOR ANY PROBLEMS AND IF IT DOES YOU CAN FIX IT BY TYPING "chkdsk (Drive Letter): /F"

BUT IMPORTANT TO SAY IN THE TIMES IVE DONE THIS IT MAKES IT FIXES IT BUT MAKES IT UNREADABLE TO MY CHOSEN DEVICE
SUCH AS MY Wii AND 3DS SO I'M UNSURE IF ITS IDEAL FOR FIXING IT AND RECOVERING EVERYTHING

ALTERNATIVELY YOU CAN USE RECUVA AND "Scan fo rnon-ndeleted files"
AND RECOVER EVERYTHING WITHOUT FORMATTING BUT-

IF CHKDSK TELLS YOU IT CAN'T FIX IT BECAUSE ITS A RAW FILE SYSTEM THEN NEITHER RECUVA OR CHKDSK CAN SEE ITS CONTENTS
IF SO THEN PROCEED WITH THIS METHOD

IMPORTANT TO MENTION:
If you have an SD or MicroSD bigger than 32GB you will need to format it using GUIFORMAT
otherwise it will be formatted incorrectly
Link here taken directly from 3ds.hacks.guide : http://ridgecrop.co.uk/index.htm?guiformat.htm

METHOD:
What we need to do first is, make sure you have enough space on your PC/Laptop to recover the data then we can start.

Next Download RECUVA from the link:

https://www.ccleaner.com/recuva/download

What is RECUVA? it's a Data Recovery Tool with Free and Paid versions but thankfully the FREE version has NO LIMITS on how much data you can recover
So no need to pay $200+ and successfully helped me recover all 90GB of my 128GB SD card and only lost 6 things out of 362 files.
If you're unsure if its safe and virus free just do any necessary scans, i think the anti-virus may cause issues when downloading though so disable it during installation.

(Once again i used this on Windows 8 and might look different on different versions)

After downloading run it and install and it should bring up Recuva Wizard,
Press Cancel to bring up Advanced Features, Click Options, Then Actions and Check the Boxes for:

"Show Files found in hidden system directories"
"Show zero byte files"
"Deep Scan (Increases scan time)"
"Scan for non-deleted files"

and lastly: "Restore Folder Structure"
After that click the drop down window and select your SD Card
then click the Scan drop down window and select "Scan Files"
and it should begin automatically and depending on how big your card is
and how much you had on it how long it'll take will vary, mine took 7hours.


IMPORTANT:
IF ITS GOING TO TAKE AWHILE
MAKE SURE SLEEPMODE OR SCREENSAVERS aren't activated as it could interfere with the process.
AND MAKE SURE YOU RECOVER THE IMPORT.DB FILE (i forgot to recover it the first time and nothing worked)

After Scan completes recover everything except files with names likes @4$;ttt4;X! etc.

NOTE: YOU CAN RECOVER THEM BACK TO THE SD BUT THERE'S A CHANCE OF NOT RECOVERING PROPERLY
SO RECOVER ONTO YOUR PC THEN BACK TO SD WHEN YOU FINISH FIXING THE FOLDERS

After finishing recovering the files locate the folders: Nintendo 3DS, Luma, etc.
My Nintendo 3DS folder was renamed to Slot0 so in case you can't find it try looking for Slot0 and rename it,
and locate the files like Themes, Splashes, Badges, Music, Video etc. and if the folders aren't there
make them again e.g: Themes, Splashes, DCIM (For 3DS Camera), Badges
and place the respective files in them and if you have NDS games
be sure to find them and find their saves folder
recreate the "Roms" folder if its not there and recreate the NDS folder
and paste them in along with the saves folder.


The Folder structure should be mostly there but in my case the game folders had their files without the needed folders
so you'll need to make the folders again and organize them correctly,
the Games folder structure go like this
GBATEMP1.png

GBATEMP2.png

And inside content should be these files:
GBATEMP3.png

And One CMD file in the CMD Folder
GBATEMP4.png


And the Data folder should look like this:



GBATEMP5.png

GBATEMP6.png


If its also like mine the extdata folder was moved out of the Nintendo 3DS folder
so just find it then copy, find the Nintendo 3DS folder and your (ID0 and ID1)
and paste when you see extdata and should add in every file thats missing
replace files if given the option to.

After fixing everything you should be good ensure Luma and GM9 are still there,
but if your missing the Homebrew Apps and your games aren't loading but
your custom theme(if you had one installed) is appearing don't fret
we're almost to the end.

In case your missing the Homebrew apps you can follow this guide:
https://3ds.hacks.guide/restoring-updating-cfw.html

(Get boot.firm and boot.3dsx from the Latest Version of LUMA if you don't have it or couldn't be recovered)

then get the finalizing.zip and follow the guide,
and replace the Luma GM9 and Finalize folders with the new ones
but if you want you can make a backup of the pre-existing ones in case your
unsure or it doesn't work.

So then just open Godmode9 (Holding Start while Powering 3DS) and Press the HOME Button
scroll down to Scripts Press A and you should see finalize.gm9
select and it'll tell you what its gonna do Press A then input the button combo
and it should reinstall all the HOMEBREW apps and make a NAND backup,
Once done iirc it reboots or you need to exit to HOME menu and then
all your games and apps should reappear!

IMPORTANT TO NOTE:
For me the Universal Updater apps weren't recovered so i just
redownloaded them to fix them TWILIGHT MENU, GYTB etc.
and the NDS Fowarder packs were gone so i redownloaded those too
then all my NDS forwarders worked properly again.

Everything should appear though including GBA injects
and NDS Forwarders.

IF A GAME YOU'RE TRYING TO PLAY GIVES YOU A "ERRORDISP GENERIC ERROR"
THAT MEANS THE SAVE FILE WASN'T RECOVERED SO JUST GET IT AGAIN AND USE
CHECKPOINT TO RESTORE THE SAVE DATA AND IT SHOULD BE FINE.

FOR ME DLC AND UPDATE DATA WAS GONE FOR MOST OF MY GAMES
BUT THATS EASY TO REPLACE SO REPLACE IT AND EVERYTHING SHOULD WORK PROPERLY NOW


Hope this helped.
Once again any questions i'll try my best to answer.
Good luck!
 
Last edited by AnthonyXeno,
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KleinesSinchen

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THIS METHOD REQUIRES YOU TO FORMAT YOUR SD CARD AND USE A DATA RECOVERY TOOL TO RETRIEVE THE DATA
That sentence IN ALL CAPS rings all the alarm bells!
"Formatting" and "data recovery" in a single sentence don't go together well.

Any write access to a medium containing data to be restored must be avoided. That includes things like attempt to do file system repair.

You should only work with an image copy of a medium (given it still works on sector level).
Any attempt to restore data can lead to making professional data recovery harder or even impossible. If something is really important and no backup exists (which should never be the case) I recommend against using various tools wildly without knowing what you are doing.

Half knowledge regarding recovery is very, very dangerous – and I don't even have a 10% knowledge on this topic. Just enough knowledge to be aware of some(!) dangers.
===========

Let's hope commercial software like the one mentioned here never actively writes do a medium it should process.
Lastly it is worth noting that hardware damaged devices might fail in the process of prolonged intense access. I've experienced this with HDDs on their last leg as well as flash memory.
 

anotherthing

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If I remember right, Disk Drill writes the data to a different device. It's paid software though, but it's not too bad considering the amount of time it takes to start a new SD card from scratch - installing, setting up, save files, and so on.

https://www.disk-drill.com/

If you try the free version, it will give you a discount on the price of the "Pro", at least it did for me. I think I got the full version with lifetime upgrades for $40 to $50. I've tried Recuva and Disk Drill, and Disk Drill worked a lot better but neither recovered everything.

Honestly, the best practice is to back up your SD cards every two months or more frequently.
 

AnthonyXeno

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That sentence IN ALL CAPS rings all the alarm bells!
"Formatting" and "data recovery" in a single sentence don't go together well.

Any write access to a medium containing data to be restored must be avoided. That includes things like attempt to do file system repair.

You should only work with an image copy of a medium (given it still works on sector level).
Any attempt to restore data can lead to making professional data recovery harder or even impossible. If something is really important and no backup exists (which should never be the case) I recommend against using various tools wildly without knowing what you are doing.

Half knowledge regarding recovery is very, very dangerous – and I don't even have a 10% knowledge on this topic. Just enough knowledge to be aware of some(!) dangers.
===========

Let's hope commercial software like the one mentioned here never actively writes do a medium it should process.
Lastly it is worth noting that hardware damaged devices might fail in the process of prolonged intense access. I've experienced this with HDDs on their last leg as well as flash memory.
Well yes and yes, i know there are other better methods for recovering a corrupted SD but this is mostly for when it corrupts into a RAW file system, i searched dozens of places and they all told me only way to fix was formatting and obviously i didn't want to but learned about Recuva and the people gave it high praise so i took a chance and it worked, and yes i know there should always be a backup but i had no space so while making space the anti-virus corrupted my SD so i had no backup.

And Recuva worked surprisingly well that it even Recovered files i deleted YEARS AGO, not sure how since i assumed it had been overwritten but i got to recover some extras.
Post automatically merged:

If I remember right, Disk Drill writes the data to a different device. It's paid software though, but it's not too bad considering the amount of time it takes to start a new SD card from scratch - installing, setting up, save files, and so on.

https://www.disk-drill.com/

If you try the free version, it will give you a discount on the price of the "Pro", at least it did for me. I think I got the full version with lifetime upgrades for $40 to $50. I've tried Recuva and Disk Drill, and Disk Drill worked a lot better but neither recovered everything.

Honestly, the best practice is to back up your SD cards every two months or more frequently.
I was in the process of making space to backup my SD and just my luck that my SD got corrupted RIGHT before i backed it up,
and yes i feel all those might work a bit better but i wanted a free method and found this, and yes it recovered most but not everything but the stuff i lost was easily replaceable so in my case it wasn't a big loss only really "important" thing i lost
was my Animal Crossing save i didn't make a backup using checkpoint cause i thought "i'll do it later, its not like anythings gonna happen" REGRET now i backup my save data more frequently.
 
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KleinesSinchen

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Well yes and yes, i know there are other better methods for recovering a corrupted SD but this is mostly for when it corrupts into a RAW file system, i searched dozens of places and they all told me only way to fix was formatting and obviously i didn't want to but learned about Recuva and the people gave it high praise so i took a chance and it worked, and yes i know there should always be a backup but i had no space so while making space the anti-virus corrupted my SD so i had no backup.
What is a "RAW file system" supposed to be anyway!? This is what Microsoft Windows says when it can't determine the file system. At least under Windows XP (my Windows knowledge is a bit outdated and rusty) this is also the case for all Linux file systems.

I've looked at the Recuva website and immediately found a problem: It tells people to download and install the application without a warning. For a recovery attempt on SDs this is fully okay. But for a general undelete solution this is highly questionable. What if the deleted file is on drive C:\ ? I'm not even talking about the problem automatic SSD trim might cause nowadays opposed to rotating HDDs. They are literally showing recovery of picture files on the main Windows drive in their screenshots.

Here my less than 10% knowledge begins: I'd probably risk file system corruption when having accidentally deleted something on C:\ and just pull the power plug in panic hoping no trim command has been sent yet and nothing has overwritten the position. Next would be copying the complete drive on sector level from a live system. Then install recovery software on another computer(!) to scan the created drive image for deleted file(s).

To be honest data recovery is such a complex topic that I would never attempt it if somebody asked me for help – to prevent causing damage myself.
============

I appreciate the effort of describing a recovery process. But I have to emphasize the risks this carries. If it is "just" 3DS data (well, some people think they are going to die if their Pokémon save is lost because the SD kicked the bucket) this is probably a viable thing to try. In the end this is the better, easier and more reliable way:
Honestly, the best practice is to back up your SD cards every two months or more frequently.

I was in the process of making space to backup my SD and just my luck that my SD got corrupted RIGHT before i backed it up,
As data is created, so must backup. Just planing a backup doesn't help.
An SD corrupting in the process of copying a huge amount of data isn't unusual (or some cheap flash stick). They can get hot when processing a lot of data. Sometimes the controller chip gives up on flash sticks or solder connections become unreliable.
 

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What is a "RAW file system" supposed to be anyway!? This is what Microsoft Windows says when it can't determine the file system. At least under Windows XP (my Windows knowledge is a bit outdated and rusty) this is also the case for all Linux file systems.

I've looked at the Recuva website and immediately found a problem: It tells people to download and install the application without a warning. For a recovery attempt on SDs this is fully okay. But for a general undelete solution this is highly questionable. What if the deleted file is on drive C:\ ? I'm not even talking about the problem automatic SSD trim might cause nowadays opposed to rotating HDDs. They are literally showing recovery of picture files on the main Windows drive in their screenshots.

Here my less than 10% knowledge begins: I'd probably risk file system corruption when having accidentally deleted something on C:\ and just pull the power plug in panic hoping no trim command has been sent yet and nothing has overwritten the position. Next would be copying the complete drive on sector level from a live system. Then install recovery software on another computer(!) to scan the created drive image for deleted file(s).

To be honest data recovery is such a complex topic that I would never attempt it if somebody asked me for help – to prevent causing damage myself.
============

I appreciate the effort of describing a recovery process. But I have to emphasize the risks this carries. If it is "just" 3DS data (well, some people think they are going to die if their Pokémon save is lost because the SD kicked the bucket) this is probably a viable thing to try. In the end this is the better, easier and more reliable way:



As data is created, so must backup. Just planing a backup doesn't help.
An SD corrupting in the process of copying a huge amount of data isn't unusual (or some cheap flash stick). They can get hot when processing a lot of data. Sometimes the controller chip gives up on flash sticks or solder connections become unreliable.
I tested recovering files on the C:\ Drive and found no issues and recovered what i accidentally deleted, and it wasn't what happened during making a backup, my anti-virus corrupted my SD and yes coouldn't agree more its easier to just have a backup lol same thing happened to my Wii SD but since it was less data i just formatted and copy pasted everything back, and i'm not quite sure what a RAW file system is really i only know that i couldn't find any help on fixing this other than "Use Chkdsk" "Format the SD" so i have this guide here if someone is unlucky enough to be like me, i searched frantically for 6 days straight and did some research and found Recuva, it was a HUGE risk but it worked out in the end so i'm 88% confident in what i'm doing but just in case i have those BIG warnings because it was a big risk for me and some people might not want to risk it especially like you said "Just" for 3DS data but i still use Recuva and so far no issues searching for deleted files on C:/ or any USB and SDs
 

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i'm not quite sure what a RAW file system is really i only know that i couldn't find any help on fixing this other than "Use Chkdsk" "Format the SD" so i have this guide here if someone is unlucky enough to be like me
I don't know where you've been looking, but I've lost count of the number of times I've recommended Testdisk and Easeus with specific links to https://www.reddit.com/r/3dshacks/comments/96kg4v/my_3ds_sd_got_corrupted_and_i_successfully/. Never heard of anyone using Recuva for this before, but hey, if it worked for you, that's great.

The Folder structure should be mostly there but in my case the game folders had their files without the needed folders
so you'll need to make the folders again and organize them correctly,
the Games folder structure go like this

00000000(GameID)/Content/ and inside should be a a CMD folder with 00000001.cmd inside
(Example GameID: Animal Crossing New Leaf is Folder 00086300)
This is unclear. (Actually, a whole lot of this is unclear, but this specifically.) Are you saying you somehow had your game folder, but none of the folders inside that folder..?
 

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I don't know where you've been looking, but I've lost count of the number of times I've recommended Testdisk and Easeus with specific links to https://www.reddit.com/r/3dshacks/comments/96kg4v/my_3ds_sd_got_corrupted_and_i_successfully/. Never heard of anyone using Recuva for this before, but hey, if it worked for you, that's great.

This is unclear. (Actually, a whole lot of this is unclear, but this specifically.) Are you saying you somehow had your game folder, but none of the folders inside that folder..?
Yes i know EaseUS is probably better but only 500MB with free version so i found a Quora question and someone listed good data recovery tools and included EaseUS and Recuva as number 1 so i thought i'd give it a try and it all worked out, and yeah i forgot to edit that i know its a bit unclear i haven't slept in a bit, but basically there is the Content folder and inside should be the game itself and One "CMD" folder where it contains One 00000001.cmd file so Content should contain 3 files and 1 folder and outside of the content folder should be a data folder which contains the .SAV file and both belong in the GameID folder in this case 00086300, is it still unclear? i'll see how to make it clearer maybe i'll use a picture cause its easier i'll see wwhat i can do.
Post automatically merged:

I don't know where you've been looking, but I've lost count of the number of times I've recommended Testdisk and Easeus with specific links to https://www.reddit.com/r/3dshacks/comments/96kg4v/my_3ds_sd_got_corrupted_and_i_successfully/. Never heard of anyone using Recuva for this before, but hey, if it worked for you, that's great.

This is unclear. (Actually, a whole lot of this is unclear, but this specifically.) Are you saying you somehow had your game folder, but none of the folders inside that folder..?
Is this clearer? first time i've done a guide before also this PC is slow asf so i keep making errors and forget to rewrite some things.
 
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Kwyjor

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Yes i know EaseUS is probably better but only 500MB with free version
It's a shame there's absolutely no way to get things like that without paying, aye. :glare:

so i found a Quora question and someone listed good data recovery tools and included EaseUS and Recuva as number 1
You say you "searched frantically for 6 days straight" and all you found was a Quora question..?

If you'd posted on here or on Reddit someone would have immediately popped up with Testdisk. I guess it's a testament to how broken Google is nowadays that you were so consistently led astray.

yeah i forgot to edit that i know its a bit unclear i haven't slept in a bit
Do you have some kind of deadline you're trying to meet..? Why not sleep before you write these things if you're not confident? Misleading instructions are just going to cause more problems for other people.

but basically there is the Content folder and inside should be the game itself and One "CMD" folder where it contains One 00000001.cmd file so Content should contain 3 files and 1 folder and outside of the content folder should be a data folder which contains the .SAV file and both belong in the GameID folder in this case 00086300, is it still unclear?
Normally when folders are lost, they're all completely lost. I think it's very weird that you still had a folder named "00086300" but that you had to re-create the folders inside.
 

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It's a shame there's absolutely no way to get things like that without paying, aye. :glare:

You say you "searched frantically for 6 days straight" and all you found was a Quora question..?

If you'd posted on here or on Reddit someone would have immediately popped up with Testdisk. I guess it's a testament to how broken Google is nowadays that you were so consistently led astray.

Do you have some kind of deadline you're trying to meet..? Why not sleep before you write these things if you're not confident? Misleading instructions are just going to cause more problems for other people.

Normally when folders are lost, they're all completely lost. I think it's very weird that you still had a folder named "00086300" but that you had to re-create the folders inside.
Well i found others but all i found was multiple Data Recovery Tools but capped at 500MB so yes i did find other probably better options but none that are free this quora question was the only free i could find lol and i would've asked on reddit but i've asked before and seen other people ask and either got ignored or given a generic answer or go straight back to EaseUS or something of the sort, and i'm a bit of a night owl so i'm always at least a tiny bit drowsy,and about the folders i'm pretty sure Recuva recovered what was left some of the folders were missing files but nothing too important and all the game folders and extdata folders and the files inside were recovered (also i only mention 00086300 because its the only GameID i have memorized) i had to manually create cmd folders and data folders in basically all the games, so thats 4 days of research 2-3 days straight of troubleshooting, but at least even if this method i used isn't viable at least the replies have other possibly better methods like you and others have said and at least something to actually look at lol because all i found was people having the same issue and no solution, i use Recuva for everything now though (THIS IS A PAID AD I WAS PAID) kidding im not actually paid otherwise i'd be using EaseUS lol
Seriously though i'll keep using Recuva for the foreseeable future and if i encounter any bugs or errors that are extremely or slightly damaging i'll definitely delete this tutoria.
 

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can anyone help me with a banned 3ds in 2024 as i cannot find any seeds anywhere to unban my 3ds:nds::cry:
 

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can anyone help me with a banned 3ds in 2024 as i cannot find any seeds anywhere to unban my 3ds
That has absolutely nothing to do with this thread and I don't know why you're posting here.

Also, online services are shutting down forever in a matter of days and it hardly matters anymore whether your 3DS is banned.
 
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